00:00:02 Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your home for deer hunting news, stories and strategies, and now your host, Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. I'm your host, Mark Kenyan. In this episode number one and twenty tay in the show, Dan and I are sharing quick updates on my idaho elk hunt, our most recent offseason scouting results, are plans for the early season and our goals for two thousand sixteen. Okay, welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to you by six Gear. Today, we're just going to do an episode with me and my trusty co host Dan. It's gonna be kind of short and sweet, but we wanted to get an episode in here before the hunting season really kicked off, at least for me and Dan, where we can talk about kind of our final preparations before the season, our goals and hopes and dreams for the two thousand and sixteen white Tail season. I don't know a bunch of crap like that, Dan, So does that sound okay to you? It sounds great. I need this. I need this. Good me too. We we haven't well what we've done. Last time we chatted was just after I killed by Montana Buck and that was I don't know, that was almost two weeks. That was probably two weeks ago. Now, um for the past. Like, I don't even know six podcasts you've put out, I don't know if I've we've been able to connect on many of those. I know there's been a bunch of scheduling issues and stuff. So we were on the Montana one together and then shoot, there's one in between where we weren't there together. But I don't know, A long story short, we we need to catch up, right, We do need to catch up. And I'm gonna cut you off right there, okay please, And like you know, I consider you a really good friend, Mark, but I get extremely jealous when I see you on your Instagram and you're up on top of a mountain where I was one year ago. But instead of being on that mountain with you, I'm in a I'm in a cubicle. I'm sorry, Dan, It's all right. I'm a big boy. I can handle it. I know that feeling though, that's a shitty it's a crappy feeling. Usually you're the one who goes PG thirteen damn. Oh, And I might get there. I don't blame you. I uh, I gotta tell you though, you know, you texted me like after the first day of the hunt and said something like, let me let me guess it's going bananas, like you were pissed and your figures would be awesome, And that first day it was kind of great. So I was like, oh, man, Dan's gonna be pretty upset. But after that day, you haven't. You didn't miss out. It was kind of more of the same that you and me had last year, right. Unfortunately, are we talking a lot of rain? We had three days of rain Jesus, So it was not quite to the level that you and me had, at least from like a length like you know, with you and me, it was the entire day for like three of those days or four of those days. We had three days, but on every one of those days we at least got some portion of the day where it stopped. So I think the first day was just that we got drenched in the morning, but the afternoon was fine. The second day we got wet morning. Well, we got both times, but there's little breaks or at least we can get out of the tent and we still hunted morning and evening and then the third day was just the morning again. Um, but you know how that is. It's just it's just tough. Everything is wet. Um. There were no tent failures on this trip, so that was a plus. That's good. That's good. Although I gotta admit da And there was lots of fun made at your expense. Okay, you guys talked it behind my back all you want, I'm okay with it. It was like like we went to bed and it was raining and soone yelled, Hey, Mark, gonna have to come to the tent with you. Oh goodies. Um. But yeah, it was like, you know, we we thought that we might be able getting the elk this time, but maybe we were too earlier. Maybe it was just hunting pressure, but they just weren't bugling. Again. The elk that we did end up finding, we're super super high and really far back. They're kind of like we had last year. Um. We you know, we did. My buddy Andy killed the cow on the first day, which was awesome, and you know after that, there was like four days later we saw a cow and a calf way up on a mountain, and then the next day or two days later we ended up seeing a herd of like seven or eight cows, and then a giant bowl. We did see one big bowl um way above us on this mountain and we just took off, I don't know how far, end up being a couple of miles or something, and it was all straight uphill um. We chased him and just never catch up. And that was kind of the extent of the elk hunting excitement. But we did see two really big bears, which is kind of nice, and a bull moose really yeah, And then on the drive home we saw a wolf and a grizzly bear, like forty yards off the road. Oh my god, that's that's awesome. You know how excited I was driving through Wyoming and I was just like, hey, look an antelope. Hey look an antelope. Hey look, and you know, like and you're like, okay, Dan, we get it. There's a thousand antelopes on this road. Okay. So what I want to know is do you remember that day? It was kind of missing out. The morning was a really good, beautiful morning, and we climbed to the top. You had some pictures taken there on your Instagram that I saw. Um. Then that day we saw those all those elk basically the next mountain over. So we went straight down and then we went straight and went straight down to the bottom. We ran into two moose and we went straight up to the top up again to try to get on those the the elk that we saw, were they in that area? So interestingly, that whole area there to the west, they well, there may have been elk in there, but we started we started hunting there, like day two check. We decided to scolpe that area out, and we did see a cow and a calf up there, and on one point we heard like two bugles in that direction. But two different guys with a bunch of horses and like outfitting camps came riding by a cent and they're gonna set up camp over there. It's like these are then they weren't together, so there's two separate camps coming in over there. So we decided to bail on that side and we moved all the way east. So we spent most of the rest of our time over to the east. And I gotta tell you this, Dan, you might not believe it, because we we we felt like we worked pretty hard, you know, when you and we were there, But we probably did like three times or more the amount of hiking and going up mountains. This time, it was like last year's trip was the most brutal from like just dealing with the elements and like that kind of challenge. This year was definitely my most physically challenging hunt. I mean, we just I think, you know, it was partly because of where the elk were, and then it was partly because I think, you know, last year, because it was so wet NonStop, it was just tough to hike. This time, we had enough gaps in the rain that the ground wasn't all Greece so we could hike. So we just hiked and hiked and hiked and hike and went higher and higher and higher. And I think also because last year, because of the challenges we had finding elk, I kind of wanted to keep pushing farther and higher to try to eventually find him. And we tried. Um, we never really did get into too many of them, but I kind of have an area of where I think they are. It's just like freaking seven eight miles off the road in the deepest, nastiest hell hole you ever you ever could find, and it's uh man, I don't know. We when we're up there, we're like, okay, this is great, but if we shoot a bullet's gonna take us like three days to get out of here and we might die, so right, And that's that's what's so crazy about. You know, you look at some of these guys who you know are using outfitters or you know they're on um, you know, private property. For these elk hunts and those guys, you really have to have respect for those d i y guys who go in deep and basically just bust their ass on public ground and always come out with a bull and it's it's never easy and it's always hard for me. I have a lot of respect for those guys because my one year of experience with elk hunting and the amount that we had to walk. And then now you say, because you had better conditions, you saw elk and you had to walk twice three times as much as we did. Oh shit, I mean those guys are doing it every year. Yeah, the guys can get it done on public land on their own. I mean, that is it is the most with no horses, that's one of the absolute most challenging things out there. It's like in the world that I know, right, so right, and the guys doing sheep hunts, you know, even higher and further. Wow. Yeah, I dream of doing those sheep hunts some day. But then I find myself like almost killing myself on an elk hunt, and like, how in the world can I handle sheep country? But now you know, you know me and you Okay, so we've been on an elk hunt together. Now do you remember that that mule deer hunt that we wanted to go on before we decided to go on the elk hunt, And how brutal that that was gonna be. Oh my gosh. I keep on thinking of that, and like we would have it would have been so tough, right, I still want to do that. We gotta whip ourselves in the shape. Dan I know I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna be I'm gonna be a badass by the time September comes next year when I go, I bet you will. I'm gonna tryst. But there's a lot to there's a lot to do in between now and then two dan Um that we get to cash in on hopefully here pretty soon. So I want to know, I want to know what's new with you in the white Tail world, because today, you know, I want to get caught up on like our white tail stuff because we haven't got to do as much. Um so I've got I've got some very excited news that I have not shared anywhere yet. Okay, I want you to tell it. But do you want to share? Do you want me to go first? Do you want to go first? It sounds like your your stuff is more important and cooler than what my stuff is. Okay, And I want to also do a little fort not four play. I want to foreshadowing. Hey, Mark, I'm a married man. Come on now, I almost said that I want to foreshadow things a little bit. And I just want you to be thinking about the fact that I want you to level with us by the end of the show on your final like goals and shoot or not shoot decision because like earlier summer, you know, we talked about that a little bit and you are all in your head not sure what you want to do. So I'll get at least want an update on that. But before we dive into all that, we need to pause briefly to think our partners at sick Gear for the support of this podcast, and today we have another sick story, and this one comes from Sick of Gear employee Kelly Thornton, who came to hunting late in life and recently she shared with us the experience of killing her first dear. But that first experience, it, uh, it was life changing for me, especially being a woman and especially being older. Uh it was, but it was positive, you know, I, like so many of us, you know, just you get the buck fever when you see it and you shake and everything just goes to heck in a handbasket. You know, nothing connects and it's just crazy. Um, But I did. I took one shot. I ended up shooting the deer. Was a gut shot, you know, probably not the most pleasant, but it was real and I had to learn, you know what that meant. And my husband, uh, he taught me about field dressing, so I actually feel dressed to my own dear. H. It was. It was a neat experience and I had an appreciation for it, and I was very thankful and blessed that God had provided that animal for me to be able to provide to our family. I felt very proud that I had gone out, that I had I had taken an animal that needed to have been taken, and I did it ethically, I you know, respected that animal completely. Um. And I started what I finished, or I finished what I started. Um, you know, from the moment you placed the shot until you know, hiking out with that animal. And so I think, yeah, for that, it was very it was very heartwarming. It was very spiritual too. I think hunting is a lot about you know, coming to terms with your spirit spirit spirituality, and uh so, yeah, it was a very spiritual time too for my husband and I. Well, I can certainly relate to those kinds of feelings, and I bet many of you can too. So this was a sick story. And if you'd like to learn more about Sick of Gears technical hunting a Peril, you can visit sit to gear dot com. And now let's get back to the show. My interesting update. Right, all right, I don't know if you probably remember, I don't know if you do, but you might remember this buck I've been talking about that I called holy Field. Do you remember that? Dear? Remember him? Okay, so Michigan, this is the deer that um, excuse me, I've got the coffee burps over here. Um. Last year I saw him many times, at least several times. I got tons of tons of daily trail camera pictures of him. I passed him in mid October. He was a really nice three year old eight pointer last year. But since I already killed that buck on opening night here in Michigan, I said, this is a deer I really want to get to next year because he'll be awesome Michigan buck for So the last time I got pictures of him, her saw him was Christmas Day last year. Now, as you know, we've talked a couple of times about this year about how excited I was hoping he'd come back. But you know, last year, he didn't show up in my farm until September. So I've been biding my time checking cameras. He had not shown up over the summer, so I was just hoping, well, one September hits, hopefully he'll be here. Well, I got back from my western trip and two nights ago, I think it was, I was doing some long range scouting and I look out in this field. Well, i've got this food plot, you know, the disaster food plot that I had this summer that got all grown up. Well, I managed to get that half of that planet. But right next to that is this thick bedding cover. And who do I see pop out of that thick bedding cover and stand there but Holy Field himself back for another year. Awesome. So before you go any further, describe what he looks like to the listeners. Yeah, so if you live in Iowa or Kansas or Illinois, you won't be that impressed. But if you're like me and live in Michigan or Pennsylvania or somewhere like that, you would be. He's he's an awesome dear for me. He is a four year old Michigan buck, which is really pretty hitless buck for sure, for just about anyone the state. Um, he's a shooter for pretty much any of the state, almost guaranteed. He's still an eight pointer, but he's just a big, heavy eight pointer. He might be maybe one five, maybe up to one thirty, I don't know, somewhere around there. That's an awesome eight point in my book, and a big body on him looks like and just like a perfect clean, wide and tall eight point rack and just a super cool dear. So I'm pumped about that. And I'm especially excited because you know here in these Michigan properties, it's tough to get a buck through for multiple years. Like there's so many deer that I see his three year olds, I'm like, oh, you know, or even two year olds. Man, if he gets to next year, be so cool to have a buck for another year. Um. But it just does not happen that much. You know. I had six Shooter a few years ago that stuck around for a few years. I had another buck called Leaner that made it a few years. But other than that, like every time I have a nice buck, he's dead before the next year. So this is now, this next opportunity I've had, like the last five six years here in Michigan to finally be after a buck for multiple years. And I think this deer is really killable. Um he where Donna say something? Yeah, So remind us how much how many acres you're dealing with? How many acres do you have control of? So this is a nine d acre property, of which fort is open crap field, and then forty five is like a square of timbery swamp and then kind of kind of think like a hockey stick. This property looks like a hockey stick. Um. So the long arm of the hockey stick is a little finger of timber, and then on the end of that is a food plot and a bunch of tall grassy brushy bedding cover and stuff. And then on the fat part, like the bottom of the hockey stick, that's kind of it's bigger than a hockey stick, but that becomes a big, fat, kind of rectangle of swamp. And then on the inside corner of that hockey stick, and then the whole outside the other side of it, that's all these big fields. So and then surrounding it is a bunch of properties that all get hunted by a bunch of different people. Um. Neighbors on one side shoot it's like anything. I talked to them once and thought they were going to get on board with not shooting anything under two two years old at least, but I'm not sure if they're doing that anymore. Um. I've got one neighbor that I stay in touch with, a really nice guy, and he usually doesn't shoot young deer um. But other than that, it's kind of open, open game on anything. And there's also public land um adjacent to it as well that just gets shot up like crazy. Um. So just it's a it's a good spot and then it's also a tough spot in certain ways. So so you're having a four year old buck gets me really excited here and um, so here's this, here's the story and him and I don't know how interested you are in the stand, but hopefully this is interesting. I'm interested. I'm interested. So okay, so holy Field. Last year, do you remember the just before the opening of last year I had this time I came with the podcast I told you about how this night I was scouting the same area and I saw like three shooters come into this one food plot like three days before opening day, and like I analyzed, is that situation and one of those bucks was the buck we called turd ferguson um. And then three days later I shot him in that same field. Well, one of the other bucks in that field was this buck holy Field. Um. So he's doing very similar to the same things he did last year, at least based on this one encounter. But last year I saw him bedded in the same little spot right in between the road and this food plot. It's just like tall brushy grass and a few brushy trees. But you know, I've never seen bucks about out there before. But he seems to take an hanker into it because I saw him come out of there several different times last year, and now here he was again this year. Um. And he feeds in this front food plot a lot, at least he did last year. I got I think eight or nine different daylight trail cara pictures of him out there, and many other after dark pictures. And then I watched him personally three different times out there in person. Um. So, of all the bucks I think I've ever had on this farm Michigan, I think he's probably the most daylight active. Um. So that's a really good thing. And he's in a very hontable spot. Now, this isn't the buck that you shot low one last year, right, correct? This is not okay? This is um that buck? He didn't that buck I think is dead because he disappeared off my cameras at the end of October. This deer did not show up the night that I shot turn um. But he showed up like two weeks later one night I was hunting that same stand and walked underneath me and I watched him bump, does around and stuff. Um. And then and then from there it was just you know, a few late season encounters. I watched him from a long distance a couple of times, lots of pictures. Um. But did I tell you about the trail camera analysis I did of him this summer? Did we talk about that? Uh? Was it when you were using the dear Lab? Yes? I think I think maybe I think I talked about that in one of the podcast ads for deer Lab, But I'm not sure we actually talked about it in person, do we? I don't think, I don't. I don't think. To me, you mentioned that you you were entering those pictures in and you noticed, you know, you were doing analysis on his movement. Yeah. Yeah, So so long story short in that, right, You know, I upload all the pictures I have of of him onto deer Lab, which is, uh, you know, an online tool that allows you to upload your traildcare and pictures and it does a number of different analyzes from that. UM, and started using it. It's a it's a neat tool. It's awesome. Yeah, I think, Um, you know, deer Lab is a great option. There's several others, I think, any you know, anyway you're going about trying to get more details out of the data, you know, it's one thing to just get a picture and say, oh, cool buck. But I think once you start asking why and looking at all the other factors that line up with these sightings or pictures, that's when you really started covering things. And deer lab is a really great tool do that. Um, so I'm interested to hear how things maybe you found out by using that too. But um, long story short, I threw all these pictures in there, and I started looking at the data that it started kind of aggregating for me, And like the big eye opener for me was that he was almost exclusively showing up on this food plot during daylight when there was south or southwest winds And I never hunt that spot with south or southwest winds because it blows right into this betting area. So I was like, wow, if that's the only time I could get a shot at him during daylight, well I'm never going to be there on those days. So what I did is it opens your eyes to a lot of things, really makes you think about. And then it also it's like, well, no, wonder that's why he doesn't come out. He knows that he's got the wind in his favor, and so that's when he comes out during daylight. Um, and I think he's got two spots. He's better because I saw him, you know, two or three nights ago with a northwest wind, but he was better in this other location. So I think when he's got a north or northwest wind, he beds on this spot, like right next to the food plot, between the road and the food plot. And if ever, every time I traditionally would go to the stand, I would walk right past this little area. So he probably sits in there and watches the a TV trail that I walk in on, sees me when I go walking in and never comes out. I was betting are until after dark? Yeah, Or he beds with a south southwest wind on the neighbor's property in this brushy area, and those are the days that I've never hunted there, and so that he comes in and I'm not there. So I did two things. Number One, if I've got a north northwest wind, I might still try to hunt it. I'm gonna try to do some long range scouting before the season and see if he does come out maybe now this year with that wind, but beds in the front area. If he does, then what I'll do is I'll take a really long circular route to get out and around um past that bedding year and then in the stand, and then if not, I'll focus on just the south southwest winds. And what I did. I put in a ground blind brushed into this like screen of sorghum and Egyptian wit that I planned around this food plot that allows me to actually walk a creek to the back side of this brushy strip, pop out of the creek right into the back of this ground blend I rushed in there that's now on the it's on the north side of this food plot, so that south wind would blow it out over this what will be a cut bean field and there won't be anything very often out there um, so it's gonna be a good setup. I put one of those scrape trees out in the food plot that's exactly thirty yards between the tree stand that i'd use on a north wind or the ground blend that I used in the south wind. Um. And I don't know if if conditions are right on opening night or the second night of the season or something, I think it could be a really good chance. Man. I'm pulling for you. Thank you. I'm pumped. I don't know, I get aroused with the chess match just as much as you know we're going into a random set and seeing a random deer. It's like I just beat your ass, you know what I mean? That is that to me is awesome. O. The chess matches everything for me. That's that's what. Just absolutely love it. This is my favorite part of deer hunting, is like putting all the strategy pieces together, or sitting here and talking to you about it, or having coffee with a friend and looking at maps and saying, well, what do you think about this versus that versus this? Um or you know. I was talking to Tony Peterson a little bit earlier today, remember him. He was on our podcast a while ago talking about public land stuff, um, and we were talking about my Montana hunt and just like how much fun it is to go into a completely new area like that, and just like you're starting from ground zero and you get peace number A on night number one, and the night number two you get another piece, and then next day and you slowly put pieces together and adjust and make a move and a move and a move, and then um, you know, sometimes you get lucky and you get checkmate and it's pretty awesome. It's like, yeah, it's like chess like war, you know, it's uh it is. It is awesome. So I'm excited. I'm super stoked for the Michigan season open here in two weeks, and the Ohio season opens this weekend. And I don't know, man, it's that time of year. But I want to talk about your stuff before we run out of time, because we're gonna do a little shorter episode today, like you know, um, so I want to make sure we talk about what's going on with your left too, Dan, what's doing the white tail from oh Man? Uh? Well about my main farm down south? So real quick, um put in. You know, I started using Deer Lab right, so they have this feature where, uh, you got the heat map right for the profiles of the different deer and then you can like break that down. Well, so my buddy, my buddy me and Ryan, you know, I don't know, it's like two fourteen when um I gave up my season to film the guy who filmed me for like five years, my buddy Ryan, right, and he we were chasing that giant called No Show Jones, and he had an encounter with him and he ended up missing the ended up missing the buck, you know, hit his auntler and didn't get didn't get an opportunity to kill him, but a deer. Yeah, So we're going into this one area and we're looking at show camera pictures and we're just like boom southeast wind, south wind, southwest wind, southeast wind, bingo southeast wind. So this one day we go in there, southeast wind. There he is, big buck and the deer are cruising this marsh all day long. So so now I know that, right, So I start entering in all these pictures into deer lab and I'm I'm seeing this this movement along this fence line, uh in this marsh for throughout different periods of the day, and I'm noticing a trend, right, I'm noticing that on south wind southeast winds they're coming up this draw where the southeast wind is blowing right up this draw. And I and that's when I realized that, Okay, if I'm just a little bit east of that and my wind is blowing parallel to that draw but not going down into it, all these deer are going to funnel through there, and that they did exactly that, And so now I have tree stands closer to this area where I'm where this main this main finger timber is button up against this draw, and I cannot wait to hunt it on the first north northeast wind. Now, what's your game plan? Are you gonna hunt that what time of season first time you get that wind? Or are you waiting? Nope, I'm gonna wait until um because the other cool thing about deer lab is that it gives you you know it. It has all the dates there for you as well. So I'm guessing somewhere all the daylight pictures for this particular fence crossing happened about oh the through October. That's when they start getting morning daylight pictures. So the first time I get a south southeast wind on October, I'm going to be in that stand nice I want to I want to make a public service announcement right here that both what you and I have just done here is we've taken gonna look at past year's trail camera pictures, annual patterns, and looking at those annual patterns and applying them to our plan for this year. And I think that's one I think for both of us. It sounds like this has been one of the big lessons we've been learning over the recent years, learning from some of these other guys we talked to. UM. So if you're listening right now and you're not thinking about that stuff, you know, if your season had start yet, this is that time. Go back, look at those old pictures. Try to see some of these trends. Whether you just look at the pictures yourself, or put them into a tool like we've been doing UM, or map it out an Excel doc or something, look for those trends and figure out you know, because these dear do things for a reason, and many times that happens year after year. UM. Not always, it's not a rule, but UM, I think the more I look at it and pay attention to it and study it, the more I see these same similar types of patterns emerge. So so yeah, man, I think I think you're onto something there. Uh And and that's the same same thing with another piece of the property. I got, so long story short, I got my trail cameras kind of half of them situated to pinch points, finch crossings, more of a travel corridor where I'm gonna pick up not necessarily a ton of pictures, but the most important pictures So when a shooter is moving through this area at what time of year, that's the most important. Not when it's over a mineral site, not when it's over like a bait pile, because that really doesn't help me because I can't hunt over those anyway, right, So, so that that information doesn't doesn't mean anything to me. It's the finch crossings, it's the pinch points. It's getting them anywhere from October one to um right before a shotgun season, that period of time and those trail camera pictures are the most important pieces of data for me now. So I've I've made the transition from mineral stations to to those pinch points, fence crossings, travel corridors, blah blah blah um. Another thing that I did was so last at the beginning of last year, late last summer, I had access to I gained access to a new farm, um and I didn't put any trail camera pictures on it because it was late, So I just went out and hunted him. So I kind of for and this was a piece of property that was closer to where I live, like ten fifty minute drive now my buddies farm. I told you two shooters, right, to him to deer that were close to booner. I ended up missing. I ended up missing one. We have to have. I need a name for that one. His name is the Bam Bam. Well, okay, I meant the farm, but the booner is the Bam Bam, the booner that I missed. His name's Bam Bam and that was the name give him to him by the landowner because he runs trail cameras too. He doesn't hunt, He just likes run trail cameras. Right, So I'm up there one day, right, he comes through, he comes up this draw. I called my buddy, and he's in the house and he looks out his window. He sees him, and then I said, I'm While I'm on the phone with him, I say, clap your hands. So he claps his hands. Did you look up? They don't run because they're used to people up there, so they slowly start making their way back down. He's following the dough and I'm and I draw back. Long story short, miss him high. Well. I continue to get pictures of him until about the shotgun season, and then I lose him. Right, no more pictures of this buck at all after that then two or earlier this week, I go out sometime last week or if I don't even know, I can't even keep track of my own asks. I feel like I'm about to hear some great news right now. Right, guess who shows up on trail camera one, like one mile northwest up the same Crieck system on this farm that I have access to. Bam bam, bam bam on the different farm, the other farm. But it's the same Crieck system, right, It's crazy. So these deer are running there, running this the same aim exact cricks creeck system, right, and it's kind of all downhill. It's a giant pinch point right now, it's all it's all you know, it's all downhill. They run this, this Crieck system. My buddy's property is like the mecca of pinch points, right right down at the bottom of where he lives. Now, this other property where I got pictures of him, I also pulled out one, two, three other shooters and and and that's shooters based off age class right, So so bam bam, I got a couple of pictures of him, so I know he's alive. So I know that mid to late October, I'm not going to touch my buddy's property and probably until mid to late October. Guess what. Guess who has a food plot at my buddies property. This guy. So now after the first frost and as the deer start maybe hitting that property, I'm gonna run trail cameras until i see any type of buck activity on that property. Meanwhile, I'm going to be hunting and putting pressure on the property to the north of there. So if I do push the deer somewhere that there, it's gonna push him south down that drainage into my buddy's property. That's nice to have those two spots like that where you can, you know, you can be in his wheelhouse maybe on property number one without being too word because you know, worst case scenario, if you happen to bump some deer, they very well might move down towards your honey hole. Right, And that's the thing, like I'm gonna do early season hunting in observation stands over top of this being over top of this bean field, and to be I'm gonna be honest with you, I might go in there on wrong winds just just to bump him south because if I if I know, if I know that he is in this area early October, guess where I know he's gonna be in mid October till late October, early November. He's gonna be running around, running that same pinch point between all these properties on my buddies, on my buddies farm. So pushing, you know, putting pressure in one specific area and maybe observing, observing. Oh hey, I saw him at three yards. Okay, um, I'm gonna I'm gonna move in to try to kill him. Okay, I didn't kill him, I spooked him. Guess where he's going, hopefully right down there to where you'll be. Yep, that's that's that's my that's that's a really aggressive tactic. Um. So the good thing is is I have shooters up north, and I have shooters down on my main farm. Although I would like to kill, you know, if if I had my choice, I would want to kill a buck that I had some kind of history with, like Tupac, that that big ten I have that's running around. But a shooter is a shooter is a shooter, you know what I mean. And that's the question that we have that I want to get to hear. So you've got you've got Bam Bam, You've got Tupac who you have like forever years of history with. You've got Gordon Bombay back this year, right. Uh? And god knows how many other great bucks on trail cameras. I can't even keep straight in my head. All these great bucks are out there, Dan, But you haven't got an arrow in one for a number of years. And you've talked about how you're feeling some pressure. So the season opens up in ten days. What's your decision right now? Where are you at on the shooter not shoot decisions scale for two thousand and sixteen four year old Again, it's a four year old. It's it's gonna be a four year old. Um. I got one like seven different seven eight different deer that I have put on a hit list that are at the age class of four year old or older, and I will pull the bow back on the first four year old that walks in front of me. I think that sounds like a good plan. Yeah, and Act says I'm taking risks this year. I'm walking creect systems, I'm buying hip waiters, I'm I'm knocking on different doors to try to gain access through. You know, hey, can I can I just park my car here, my truck here so I can walk the correct into the place that I hunt, you know, if I have to get wet, if you know, I'm to the point now where I figured this farm out enough to where I know that I'm I'm fffing things up driving through the farm on a morning hunt, I'm pushing everything away from me driving my truck back there. To get down there, I have to come in through an opposite direction. So then I'm relying on the other hunters doing what I'm doing. But guess what, I'm in between where they're coming in from and where they need to go. So you're just waiting an ambush, right if like, hopefully that works right? Knock on what you know? You can only ever figure so much and then you have to kind of leave it into fate's hands and hope it all works out that way we wanted to. But man, sounds like plans are coming together. Well, I don't want to. I'm not gonna say it, Dan, Well, I'm not. Well, I don't say it because last year you said this is your year, and you know you can be you can part of being a good hunter is sealing the deal when the opportunity meets the hard work, right. So when the you know, that is the part that I have to finish. I have to put the period at the end of the sense I can get in position. And I've been doing that for a number of years. But it's you know, bad shots. Tupac should have been dead in two thousand and thirteen as a four year old. Right now he's uh whatever, he's a years old or something. So you know, if I can get him now, that would be awesome, good story. If I can get any four year old, I mean I'm not I don't care. If it's a hund four year old, it's getting an arrow at it. If it's inside you know my shooting range, well, I won't say it's your year. I'm just gonna say you're do and you deserve it. And I got my fingers crossed for you. Hey, take that back. Nobody here's and here's my opinion. Nobody deserves anything. You have to work for it. Nobody deserves You know, there's guys out there who have hunted hard, just like me, out in public, ground, out in you know, that are doing the same thing that me and you are doing, and they've struck out several years and they're getting frustrated and and there one you know they're going to do. It's your year, You're do You know you deserve it, You don't deserve it. You gotta you gotta work. This is like we said, this is a chess match, man, this is this is you're trying to take an animal's life, and that life, that animal knows it, and he is trying to avoid you, and you have to beat him at his own game. Sorry, that's me. That's me like getting fired up. I won't argue with you on that. Sorry, I got really fired up there. All I will say is that I believe in you. That's all I'll say that. I believe in you. You put in the work, and I'm excited to see how these coming weeks come, come out, steps out for you. Oh man, I'm stoked about that. That's ten days away and four days from now, I go down to Ohio for opening weekend. And I don't have his high hopes for that. It's gonna be like high eighties, super hot. But I'm gonna go down there for two quick days. Check cameras observation stands in the evening and um, and then we probably won't go back till like late October or November. We're gonna leave it alone. So this is just like kind of intel visit really fast and quick and then um, you know, like every year, I'll kind of watch the weather and see if something really gives me a reason to go down there. But this season is upon us. Man, um, all right, real quick before we go. It sounds like, for you a successful season, you know, I know we always talked about the success is different than killing a deer, etcetera, etcetera. But let's just focus on actually killing part of hunting. Sounds like, for you, kill a four year old buck and you are happy camper. Yeah. Amen, Alright, My goal for the season is to kill holy Field in Michigan and then a four year four year old in Ohio. If I can do one of those two things, I'd love to do both. But if either one of those come together, that's that's a super exciting, awesome season as far as I'm concerned. On top of the fact that I was able to pull off my goal in Montana, so what real quick, real quick, and I know we gotta go. I'll make this fast So my wife had a conversation with me the other day, and in this conversation, she expressed interest in me killing more does so we could have more meat to take to the processor for deer sticks and dear jerky that she likes. Heck, so now with her wanting these things, she's it's like, yeah, I don't care go out and hunt. I just want you to, you know, you know, take a deer of the processor and make some jerky because I really like it. So my wife is now a little bit like in tune with what I'm trying to get at, and that's the first for me. I'm really excited about it. So, like the first two three weeks of October, I have three dough tags in two different counties, and I am going to kill my goals to try to kill three does. And I don't give a shit if I have one pounds of deer sticks in my freezer. I'm gonna I'm getting deer sticks from my wife this year. That's awesome, dude, I love it. But I want to tell you one thing. You've got to stretch those dough tags over the whole season so that even in the middle of November you can be telling her, well, honey, I have to hunt all day for the next ten days because I get to get those deer sticks for you. So states She also says to me, so you know, I told her I got three dough tags, and she says, yeah, so you can, you know, so you can get some beer sticks this year. I'm like yeah, And she's like, I also want you to kill a big buck this year, and and I didn't even know what to say. I was just like, yes, yes, yes, I will. Did a tear? Did a tear come running out of your eye at that point? No, because I know that about four days into the November rut, she's gonna be want my ass back. Hold We'll enjoy the dream now, I guess right? Right? Amen? Alright dude, Well, with that, we're gonna to shut this one down a little bit early, but thank you all for joining us. Stay for these quick updates, and stay tuned for a lot more in the coming days and weeks. We've got some great episodes lined up for you, both on this podcast and Wild Podcast, and I'm also publishing new journal entries on the blog after every hunt, so be sure to check those out. And we'll have video of my Montana Hunt up on YouTube here shortly too, so be sure to keep your eyes appeeled for for all sorts of interesting stuff on those lines. And finally, we need to thank our partners who helped make this podcast possible, So thank you too, sit A, gear, Redneck, Blinds Hunter, a Maps, Yetti, Ozonics, Carbon Express, may Even Optics, and the White Tail Institute of North America. And with all that said, thank you all for joining us today. Good luck with your upcoming hunts, and stay wired to Hunt.